Waking up in the bush

[Spriter]

I dig it.. use a grid and level that horizon though.

If you look more at it, you can see the forest, on the other side of the lake, is getting smaller. This is because the lake shore is farther away.

I took the picture about 20 feet above water lever. It is then normal that the horizon, if you take the shore lake as the measurement, seems to be off.

this might be accentuated by the two diagnonal lines created by the shoreline in the foreground.

This being said, at 900km distance, I can't verify this. And the more important should be that it seems right for you.

BTW, it's a real honor for me that you dig it... should you want the original raw file, just pm me.

[mindforge]

I usually balance a picture visually... as a graphic designer, we are literally trained to understand that a straight line is a necessarily a straight line.

You might -- just for the fun of it -- see if you can visually balance the weight in the image. I shoot a lot of skateboarders at a local skate park and because I have to shoot so fast sometimes I get my horizon off. I have learned that it is better, at least with the action photography that the horizon be balanced by visual weight and not by a straight line.

Many times, one of my pictures will be barely off on the horizon line but the visual weight is actually on so it looks balanced. I always balance by sight and weight.. I still use a grid to get the balance right and I usually pull back to see if the weight of the picture makes the horizon look off, if so, I balance it visually..

Have you ever had one of those pictures that just will not visually balance, I have had a couple of sunsets like this where I had a treeline off to one side and an island on the other with water in the middle.

[tirediron]

I usually balance a picture visually...

This is the way to go. If it looks right, it is right. Because of perspective, positioning, etc, a straight and level appearance doesn't always mean straight and level. The OPs image (which I quite like, but agree is a little heavy to the left) appears fine from a visual perspective, despite measurements showing that it is in fact off something like 30 arc-seconds.